All Men Must Serve
by Mikoyasha
Summary: Brienne, short on cash, offers Jaime a ride to university but immediately regrets it. Despite that, she can't help always running into the insufferable jock once she gets there. BrienneXJaime. University AU.
1. Milkshakes

**A/N: Hello, all! I'm back with a new fanfic... It's not "What's Dead May Never Die" for complicated reasons, but I do plan on eventually reposting that one... maybe. I hope you like this one; it's an AU sooo I hope you don't mind. I've been really into them lately. I'm posting this tentatively-I may take this down if I ever feel strongly compelled to do so in the future-but let me know what you guys think. I'm sorry for the long wait; I've been struggling with some things regarding insecurity as a writer, molasses-like writer's block, etc. Plus, school is driving me crazy so this is a product of many unfortunate factors... haha!**

**A shout out to all of you lovely people who ushered me back in with your heart-wrenching enthusiasm. I wish I could articulate how important you are to me.**

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**ALL MEN MUST SERVE**

_**Chapter One: **__Milkshakes_

She regretted taking the ad already. She'd breathed it in, hands shaking at the thought of one thousand dragons, notes wadded into a supple bend as she stashed it away into her college fund. She'd known it was sketchy, would probably end up doing her more harm than good—yet here she stood, leaning against the hot white of her Honda Civic. Her arms rested on the hood of the car, sweat pooling down the back of her hooded black t-shirt. _What's he doing_? She ran her fingers through the prickly hairs at the base of her skull, wet. _It's been an hour._

She could see the sea from here, the whispery waters ablaze with the yellow of the noon sun. Part of her vaguely desired to jump from the shorter cliffs into the ragged and warm waters, chilling her body. Brienne had lazed in the car at first, daydreaming in the air condition. Twenty minutes later, she'd cranked down her windows and silenced the engine and the radio in an effort to conserve gas. Within three minutes her skin was melting into the seat, her fingers burned against the steering wheel, and her knees suddenly seemed too close to her chest. She'd thrown open the glove compartment, slathered on some deodorant, and stumbled out of the car.

She would have hazarded that being near the sea might have had more of a bearing on the temperature, but only the slightest of breezes buffeted her slick biceps. Brienne laid her head against the hood of the car with her eyes closed, felt the heat eat at her eyelids, and looked again at the mansion, perched on a distant hilltop. She could not make out any details except for lavish beauty. It was huge and modern, with what appeared to be two high-ceilinged floors. Wide and stately entrance steps led to mauve archways that enshrouded a breezy wrap-around porch. A fountain gurgled in the center of a massive and laundered courtyard, bustling with wild-colored flowers. After the initial ten minutes, Brienne had driven up the long, gravel pathway through the trees. Sadly the mansion was surrounded by a large gate; security guards were posted outside, and entry required a numeric code. The guard had attempted to call him twice, but then the guard had had to politely shoo her away.

Calling was worthless. She'd attempted twelve times with no luck. The only time she'd heard from him was when she'd answered the ad. He'd texted her a time and a place.

"Jaime Lannister," she grumbled, kneading her sunburned eyebrows with her fingertips. _What a great first start._ She could feel the energy leaving her body in the heat's slow kiss…

"Are you gonna pass out already, lightweight?"

Brienne's eyes jerked open, searching wildly for the source of the voice.

"Dude," he said, approaching her from behind, "You look like a fucking tomato."

She turned to face him—he hadn't come from the direction of the house—and slicked her sweat-greased hair back from her forehead. She saw him grimace, but she hardly noticed. Jaime Lannister was shirtless: he was chiseled and bronze, approximately her height, with broad shoulders and a relentless cocky sway. His eyes were deep and green, and his hair… woven gold that fell in waves to his jaw.

Brienne knew she was going to hate him from the moment she saw him.

"It's been over an hour," she said shortly, "Where exactly were you?"

Jaime combed his hair with his fingers and shoved a backwards baseball cap on his head. "I thought I'd take a quick dive before snoring my life away for the next year. Is that too much to ask?" He narrowed his eyes at her. "What the fuck, are you a _woman_?"

Brienne ignored him; she felt her face heat, but it was already beet red. "You could have texted me a later time. You specifically told me this time."

"You _are_ a woman—you sound like one, anyway. Kinda husky in a trans way."

"I'm glad your summer away from school hasn't dulled your observational skills."

He neared her, eyebrows furrowed. "You've got like six million freckles."

She felt her shoulders stiffen as he entered her personal space. _The freckles weren't nearly as bad before, but after an hour of standing out here waiting for someone to finish his swimming lessons…_ "Where are your bags?" she asked curtly, eyeing his hands, which were hooked on the lip of his sagging sweatpants. Empty. She looked around his figure to the front of her Honda, hoping to find a sports tote bag at the least. She stifled a groan and it came out as an exasperated sigh.

"I don't have any baggage today, I'm a free man," he smirked. He maneuvered around her and grabbed the handle of her back door. "Mind unlocking it, Freckles?"

Brienne fought the urge to slam his face into the tinted window. "You're telling me you don't have _any _bags? You're going to school hundreds of miles away and you don't even have a change of underwear?"

"Why, you planning on having some fun in here?" he patted his hips. The question seemed forcibly suggestive.

Brienne didn't reply.

"I've got my wallet, that's all that matters. And I've got all your wages right here in its leather pockets. I shipped the rest of my shit ages ago. You worry too much, Frecks." He tugged on the handle again. "Unlock it."

She obliged. He slid into the backseat, lounging with his head against the opposite door so that he could have an unshielded view of Brienne. She ducked into the driver's seat, aggressively jabbing the key into the ignition. The engine wearily grumbled to life. She reset her rearview mirror (she'd adjusted it so that she could watch for his descent from the mansion) and found Jaime's incredibly attractive face in its reflection. Brienne sighed again inwardly.

"You look sad, wench. Is it because I'm not sitting shotgun?"

"Yes, that must be the reason," she said dryly. Her arm draped over the back of the passenger seat as she turned to look out the rear window. She slowly gassed the small car in the reverse and swung around in the gravel. Jaime's bristly cheek grazed her right forearm and she jerked it back to her side.

"I'm sitting back here because I just want it to be clear that you're the chauffeur," he breathed, tipping his hat off into the front seat, "And that this is an unbearable but irrevocable arrangement."

_Congratulations on your use of multisyllabic vocabulary words,_ she thought bitterly. "Fine by me," she said. _I just want it to be clear that you're my prisoner and I don't fraternize with insufferable, spoiled brats._ He was lucky he'd promised her such a handsome purse for putting up with him, otherwise she'd be tempted to stomp on her brakes and watch his head bounce violently off the back of the passenger seat's head rest.

The drive out of Lannisport was calming. The busybodies hustling at the ports, the mostly-white, preppy kids shooting soccer balls through field goals, the frilly dogs strutting down residential sidewalks… all of it stilled Jaime. It filled Brienne with a nervous energy that she couldn't account for, and she thought, _I want to come back to this place someday._ She didn't know if she could speak for the isolated residence some miles back, looming over the city like a sunbathing lion. Something could be said for Jaime's family—they were _rich_—they were influential. The whole city seemed to have one fat ear perked up for the Lannister name. Lannister was on warehouses, it was on a few company signs, and she spotted one law firm… someone or other "& Lannister." She suspected his name was on places that she couldn't see.

"Your family appears to be quite far-reaching," Brienne said civilly, slowing to a stop at a cross-section in the road. She waved the go-ahead to a woman in a minivan.

"You might say that, wench," Jaime replied. He'd taken a liking to that word. "But it's mostly my father who is far-reaching. Quite the menace on Wall Street."

"I see," she said appreciatively. In reality, the thought made her slightly nauseous. "If you care to know, my name's Brienne."

"Cute that you think I care, chauffeur."

"Thought I'd give you the benefit of the doubt," she muttered as she turned down an asphalt road that smelled distinctly of dead fish. She rolled up the windows.

"Fuck." Jaime waved a hand in front of his nose.

"Pretty bad scent for business," Brienne agreed.

"I've smelled a woman's blood before, wench," Jaime huffed, "_You _smell like a menstruating _cow_."

Brienne's neck colored and she clenched her jaw. _We are barely out of Lannisport!_ "Get out of my car. Keep your stupid money and enjoy your walk back to Neverland."

"Okay, _okay, _wench—"

"—_Brienne_—"

"I under_stand,_ I know it's the fish, don't be such a fuckin' stick in the mud. I just get grumpy when I'm hungry, okay?"

Brienne glared at him in the rearview mirror, infuriated by his sloppy grin, like the whole world could have belonged to him, if he'd only asked.

He met her eyes and winked. "Here, let me give you a shoulder massage. How would you like that, _Brienne?_ Just drive." Jolts went through her when his thumbs pressed circles into her lower neck and firmly grasped her shoulders, kneading her knotted muscles. But she wasn't sure if that was due to the massage, or the way he'd purred her name, rolled it around on his tongue like a piece of candy.

"You have traps the size of a linebacker," Jaime grunted, and she violently shrugged him off, feeling more and more stupid the longer he spoke. He was incapable of saying anything good about her. She was pretty thick-skinned, but she would be surprised if her self-esteem wasn't in tatters by the end of the trip.

Brienne sped up the ramp of an overpass and merged into traffic. The speed helped her to blow off some steam. She wanted to gas it some more, just to feel the thrill gust out the anger that was mounting in her chest, red-hot embarrassment that might soon well over in tears. She followed the speed limit religiously, though, thinking, _Dragons, dragons, dragons._

Jaime slithered up to the back of her seat, breathing on her neck. His arms were crossed behind her headrest, and he just stared at her rearview mirror hoping to make eye contact with her. _He's just bored,_ she realized finally, though that didn't make the situation easier. She still had another eight hours to deal with his short attention span and sadistic, recreational jabs. She felt the curled ends of his hair tickle her shoulder and she resisted shivering.

But he noticed the goosebumps and laughed.

"What, do you wanna fuck?"

Brienne jerked, veering slightly into the left lane. She straightened her arms, gasping. She tried to remain stoic because she knew his ministrations were purely uninterested, she tried to soak up apathy, but found herself blistering at his persistence.

"Why would I want to even _touch_ you? All you've done is be a complete—jerk—"

"Maybe you have a kink for that. I dunno, some chicks do. You wouldn't be the first."

Her breathing slowed as she focused on the black highway slipping beneath her wheels. "Well, you don't have to worry about that. I have no interest in you."

"Of course you do," he scoffed. "Have you ever _been_ fucked?"

Brienne's ears were on fire, but her face remained hardened. She turned up the air conditioning. _Bad move, he noticed that, too,_ she thought. "Please stop using such profane language. And I don't see why it's any of your business, I'm just your driver."

"It's okay, I know you haven't," Jaime retorted breezily, pulling at her earlobe. "But you wanna. Don't you?"

"Jaime, I'm driving," Brienne said quietly. _This is terrifying._ Her heart was racing and she could hardly stop herself from going above seventy-five miles per hour.

" '_Jaime, I'm driving,'_" he breathed on her neck, mimicking her, " '_Jaime, Jaime, Jaime…'"_

_Turn on the radio! _She screamed at herself, _Do something!_ She took a deep breath. Being on the road greatly limited her reactionary possibilities.

Jaime chuckled. "I bet you want me to be your first, huh?"

She went cold. Her senses came back to her one by one as she fought the roiling nausea pitting herself in waves against her throat. _Brienne the Beauty. I can't fuckin' do this. Are you really planning on fucking her, Hunt? Huntin' for the cunt. Haha, well, damn. Congratulations. Looks like the pot's yours._

Brienne threw her arm back and elbowed Jaime in the face. He yelped; in the mirror she saw him clutching his cheek and she felt a wash of dread run through her chest. She'd elbowed him right in the cheekbone, at least, no chance of breaking his nose…

"_What the fuck was that for?_"

Her eyes steaming with unshed tears: "Why do you have to say such _cruel_ things? What did I ever do to you? Did I ever do anything so bad to you?"

"Are you _joking_?" he sputtered incredulously.

"Are you some kinda _rapist?_" she spat at him.

"What the fuck, what the fuck," he hissed as he touched the tender cheek below his eye. But he didn't say anything more, didn't want to mess with her anymore, didn't want to play with her anymore. Although he hadn't denied the accusation, Brienne didn't think Jaime Lannister was as predatory as he was making himself out to be. She held herself together as cold sweat rolled down her sunburned jaw, weaving in and out of freckles. And all she could think was, _thank God. Thank God._ Because even if he'd felt it, Jaime Lannister hadn't said, "_Who the fuck would want to fuck you anyway?_"

Nobody spoke for three and a half hours. Brienne realized after the first hour or so that the Jaime had fallen asleep, sprawled out over the backseat. His nap afforded her some peace of mind. She watched the trees change in morphology. Long to short, thin to fat, fat to fatter. Then color. Somewhere along the way the trees had adapted yellows and reds, more readily available for autumn than Lannisport. The sky turned a hazy, orange-blue, getting sleepy in its dome over Westeros. _Maybe I'll pull over in a bit, and we'll eat._ The thought of spending waking hours with him dulled her spirits.

Brienne regretted meeting him, regretted hitting him in the face. He probably thought he was flattering her. A spark of annoyance zapped her between the shoulder blades. _Serves him right, then._ The two of them were probably only four hours outside of King's Landing, and four and a half hours outside of the high intensity traffic at Valyrian University, centralized there. It was a prestigious university, bested by no other, and equal to perhaps one or two other prestigious universities. It made sense for such a conceited, spoiled-rotten jerk to be enrolled. Brienne rubbed her right eye.

She, herself, was there on an athletic scholarship: basketball. Her grades remained pretty above average, but weren't enough to score her an education that cost roughly fifty thousand gold dragon notes per year. Basketball had done that for her. Brienne glanced behind her, eyeing Jaime's disheveled, sleeping form with some disdain. _I'll have to look at the dorms again. Or maybe the cafeteria. One of them is bound to be named after his father._

Despite her full-ride scholarship, there were unforeseen costs. Outside expenses added up quickly at such an expensive university with so many tenured professors; even food could cost a leg and an arm when you had no money. So she'd been doing odd jobs off and on since freshman year and through the summer. She'd liked them, for the most part, and that was probably why she had been so cocky. _How bad can it be, right?_ She'd said, _What's the worst that can happen? He'll give me the silent treatment for being a little broke?_

A couple months into her freshman year, she'd helped move boxes for her basketball "captain," or coach. Renly had been moving from the western dorms into an apartment. He'd needed her strength and alacrity. Between Brienne, Renly, and his uppity friend, Loras, they'd managed to move him into his new apartment before dinner… Brienne frowned. She didn't want to think about those times. During Christmas break of the previous year, she'd done her Bio professor a favor and babysat her up-and-coming high school freshman while her mother went to a conference out of town and the girl's other siblings went to stay with some relatives. Brienne had taken to Arya—she reminded Brienne a lot of herself—though the young girl was a good deal fierier, more mischievous, and wordlessly prettier. The two had ended up getting into a lot of trouble themselves; in the kitchen, at least. They'd burnt popcorn and microwaved hamburgers which were still encased in the crinkly and matted aluminum foil. They'd both had a good laugh about it after they'd doused the meat patty in the sink.

A grunt from the backseat.

Brienne's stomach dropped a little. She took note of the exit sign.

"Where are we?" Jaime asked flatly, sleep cluttering his voice.

"Silverhill," said Brienne too casually. "I… I thought we'd stop in about two miles to grab a bite to eat."

Jaime grunted again and sat up, combing his hair with his fingers twice (_good as new, _Brienne sighed) and stretched. Brienne averted her eyes from his lean pectorals and shapely triceps. She noticed he had green bruises along his obliques and under his belly button. His face was also beginning to color bluely.

"Like what you see?" Jaime quipped with a yawn.

Brienne rolled her eyes. "Seeing as you're naked, looks like I'm just going to have to go through the drive-through." She paused at a red light for some moments, awkwardly avoiding any mirrors lest she make eye contact with Narcissus. She eased into the gas as the light turned green, pulled alongside the cemented median, and switched on her blinker. It ticked obnoxiously until Brienne turned into McDonalds. Her Honda slid into the drive-through and she rolled down her window.

"Welcome to McDonalds, how can I help you?" said an unamused woman via the little intercom.

"What do you want?" Brienne asked Jaime over her shoulder.

"Three orders of the eight-piece nuggets and two milkshakes."

"Are you joking?"

"Would one milkshake be enough for you, giant?"

Brienne returned to the intercom, repeated Jaime's order and added the double cheeseburger meal and a cup of ice. When they rolled around to the pay window, Brienne begrudgingly paid, although Jaime offered. When they received their food, Brienne pulled away and parallel parked between a large, red Ford and a tiny, black Mini Cooper. She handed Jaime his order, glowering at him in judgment. Then she emptied half of her cup of ice into a wad of napkins. She turned somewhat awkwardly and pressed the shoddy ice pack against his face. Jaime jerked initially, taken aback by the sudden chill. But then he relaxed into the cold and put his hand over hers in order to hold it for himself. Brienne's cheeks colored a little, but she doubted he noticed. She removed her hand and turned off the engine.

"Look, I'm really sorry," said Brienne, "I overreacted. Usually I have a better head on my shoulders about these… er, types of things."

"Yeah, yeah," Jaime said insensitively.

Brienne turned to face her food, removing her fries and burgers from the thin paper bag. She took a large swig of her coke. Then she, too, felt something cold on her cheek. Jaime pressed one of the milkshakes to her cheek. A drop of condensation slid off of her jaw.

"I knew you were too stuck up to get one for yourself, wench," Jaime smirked, "So I took the liberty of buying you one. Enjoy yourself for once. Your face is always scrunched up like you're about to shit out a stone."

Brienne chuckled and took the milkshake, taking a small sip before docking it into a cup holder. "Thanks for the genteel gesture, Jaime, but… uh, I did still pay for them."

"Oh, shut up. I offered."

"So you did." There was a few moments pause while they indulged in the chemical oasis of fast food. The burgers tasted a little spongy but the ketchup and pickles were just right, and the fries were hot and straight out of the oil, doused in salt. Brienne watched Jaime dip a handful of fries into his milkshake.

"Hey," Jaime started, cocking his head to the side, "I'm sorry, too, I guess." His hair fell down to his shoulder while he looked at her from below. His eyes were even more magnetic when they were _really_ watching you, when his façades were still sleeping under his skin, ears perked, ready to shoot up at the slightest sign of vulnerability.

"For what?" said Brienne, although she knew.

"You know… fuck, do I have to say it? Some girls like that type of aggressive talk. Shit, I wouldn't have ever done anything… I have a lot of respect for women, I just give them what they want. What can I say, I'm a conditioned animal." That grin again. And there were the defenses.

"I know you wouldn't have," she shrugged, "There was just…" But she regretted starting her explanation; she knew that she had nothing to say to him that he could ever understand. She ate a few more fries, attempting to hide the pensive scrunch of her eyebrows and the anxious gnawing of her chafed lips.

"Can I ask you a personal question?" said Jaime, rubbing his thumb along his lower lip.

_Why not?_ She thought. "Why not?" she said.

"How the _fuck_ are your arms almost as big as mine? Can I get some pointers? I wanna grow up to be like you, wench…"

Brienne shook her head, throwing up her hands in exasperation. She buckled her seatbelt, stowed her food within reach of her prying fingertips, and stuck the key in the ignition. With a swift twist the engine revved. And died.

"Piece of shit," Jaime breathed from behind her.

The rest of the drive was uneventful, as Jaime fell into a food coma for several hours. He was startled awake by the sound of city traffic: violent horns honking, tires screeching, police sirens, the works. He talked her ear off about nothing important, and it soothed both of them for a short time. Jaime was pleased when she got lost downtown because it gave him a chance to '_prove his worth as a man to a maiden_.' He articulated the directions well, and they were on campus before nine.

The campus was still mostly empty, as classes had yet to start and orientation was still a week away. The buildings were as beautiful as ever in the night glow. The purple sky seemed to glisten behind the gothic buildings covered in long-tailed ivy. The clouds drifted low and lazily on the heat and the streetlights cast white halos over the large, gated archways of Valyrian University. Brienne stopped in the main Quad near a couple of frat and sorority houses because he said he wanted to meet someone there.

She'd thought she would have been glad to be rid of him, but now that she was getting ready to exorcise herself of his traumatic character, she felt somewhat lethargic. Jaime opened the backdoor and rolled out of it without any hesitation. Brienne stepped out somewhat awkwardly, unaware of how they should say goodbye to one another. They both walked out of the street towards a large, bronze statue at the entrance of the main quad. It was some famous maester, standing bent under the weight of the hardened chain, which thickened into the base of the statue. At his feet, the inscription read _VALAR DOHAERIS._

"Thanks, wench, it's been great." Jaime opened up his wallet and pulled several hundred-notes out, slapping them casually into her huge, white palm. "And by 'great' I mean, I never want to see your beastly face again."

"You have a way with words."

Jaime slapped his baseball cap on again. "Call me if you ever get laid, so I can do him one better."

"I think it's likely that I'll pass on that offer," Brienne intoned, though swathes of pink licked down her neck like wildfire.

But Jaime was already strutting in the direction of the open quad, still shirtless, back tightening in such a way that had never appealed to her before as the moonlight hit his muscled shoulders and sank down between his shoulder blades.

"We'll see!" he shouted without looking back.

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**Also, I only had this posted for about a week or so last time it was posted, but some people didn't like my rendition of Jaime. Let me just say I've put a lot of thought into Jaime's characterization and I have to take into account the fact that he is twice as young in this AU as he is in canon. I want him to be a little more impulsive, a little more of a braggart, charismatic but in a highly sexualized way, less guarded but more defensive, etc. This is just how I perceive Jaime to be as a "youth." Of course, feel free to leave any comments. I looooove hearing from you (no matter what you say), and your kind and thoughtful words really help me to write.**

**Yours,**

**Miko**


	2. Courtship

_**Chapter Two: **__Courtship_

_I must be a masochist,_ Brienne mused, rolling her tight shoulders after the long drive. She fantasized about the cloudy deepness of her mattress, about sleeping until the rise of hot noon. _I put up with that kid for over eight hours._ She inwardly groaned, opening her eyes as she shifted to the front of the line. She stepped up to a hard-maple wood desk which ensconced three squat and bespectacled women. Grumpily perched in their rolling chairs they resembled the Three Fates, and Brienne found her polite smile twisting into a grimace as they registered her name in the computer. They confirmed her name, made her sign some papers which she reluctantly left unread, feeling pressure under the slow camel gaze of the receptionist.

The receptionist lazily slid Brienne her ID with a room code number scribbled jaggedly on a scrap of paper. She stowed it away in her pocket, nodding to the women. Behind her, her suitcases bumped noisily over the ceramic tiles. The residential hall bore white, scripted letters which read _The Dothraki Sea_ on a long ledge protruding beneath the ceiling_._ She followed vague signs, arrowed and numbered, to the west wing and then rolled her bags into a smooth, steel elevator which reminded her of an industrial oven. Fourth floor.

This was her first time in The Dothraki Sea; she'd been set up in a small building to the northwest of campus called White Tree during her freshman year. It had been converted from a rundown hotel into a fairly unglamorous dormitory, black fire escapes lacing its sides in zigzags. It had been intimate, but far too insulated, and Brienne had found it suffocating. _It was too far from the gym,_ she rationalized, as she appraised this jarringly modern building with skyway hallways and long, longitudinal windows. Her room was directly at the end of the hall. She inserted her ID into the metal slit and tapped in the proscribed code.

The door was heavy and swung open only with a shove of her shoulder. She ran her fingers through her hair in anticipation of meeting her new roommate, her breath too warm in her mouth. A dull sound of gushing water swelled from the closet-bathroom to her left and pale, ochre rays of light leaked from the crack beneath the door. Brienne suddenly became very aware of her stink. She discreetly lifted her shirt collar and took a small sniff. Her clothes smelled fairly musky, but the deodorant mitigated the rough and sticky odor of perspiration.

Room 422, however, bore an enchanting aroma of jasmine. There were two beds situated on parallel walls. On the right the slightly graying mattress was bare. _My side,_ Brienne thought. She fingered the skinny wardrobe at the foot of the bed, opened it and confirmed its emptiness. She propped the black duffle bags against it. A deep black-velvet comforter draped the girth of the bed on the right side. Zebra-striped pillows adorned its length and she noticed a laptop and a studded cellphone resting in the black folds. Two desks stood like sentries beneath the wide window at the head of the room.

Brienne lacked the stamina to fully unpack, but she yanked out a crumpled, polka dot sheet and hastily curved it around the plush edges of the mattress. She didn't bother unfolding her blue comforter. She tossed the white-suited pillows atop it and lethargically slumped at her desk. Brienne was dimly aware that the mindless beat of the water had ceased. After several seconds, there was the small click of a door opening. _Does she know I'm here? _Brienne hastily whipped out her cellphone, pretending to text on her tiny flip phone as the woman entered the room. Brienne hunched over the device, giving her roommate time to get dressed. There were no sounds of shock from behind her, just light shuffling.

She scrolled through her texts. At the top, Catelyn Stark. A favor for Sansa tomorrow morning. Below that:

**Jaime Lannister: **_mansion at casterly rk. Lannisport. cm 12 on the 9__th_

Brienne scowled at their first pathetic exchange. She began to type.

**Me: **_Arrogant bastard._

She stalled by deleting the text and adding embellishments.

**Me: **_Arrogant, entitled, smug bastard._

**Me: **_Rude, demanding jerk._

**Me:**_ Bottomless stomach Lannister & co. no luggage brat._

"I assume you are Brienne," came a cool voice from behind her.

Brienne reluctantly turned, pale neck feeling thick and muscular as she snapped her phone shut. The phone was almost completely shelled beneath her clammy palm. The woman before her was surreally gorgeous in a way that was not at all ephemeral. She wore a red-silk robe which grazed her mid-thighs. Brienne could see hints of full cleavage bolstered by a black brassiere. A fluffy pink towel cocooned her hair and the smooth planes of her face were rosy from the steam. She narrowed her eyes slightly as she regarded Brienne with husky, peridot eyes.

"Yes," Brienne said slowly, feeling her abs constrict with nervousness. "Brienne Tarth. And you are?"

The woman rested her leg on her plush bed, forming a smooth arch from the base of her buttocks to her pointed toe. She lathered lotion along her shin, then flexed her calf and it glistened as she kneaded her muscles. "Didn't you see my name on the door?" she finally asked.

Brienne felt strangely aggressive after this great display of femininity; she imagined the bulky twist of muscles in her own thighs swelling, swelling, her shoulders like asymmetrical boulders dusted with mineral blemishes. "No, I must have missed it… On the door?" She had been too focused on the door code…

The woman pulled at the tail of her towel and sandy blond curls shook down to her shoulders. She shook it out provocatively and Brienne got the impression she'd spent a great deal of time studying swish velocity in shampoo commercials.

"It's Cersei," she said.

"I'm Brienne," said Brienne.

A strange look from Cersei. "So you said."

Brienne blushed. She stood awkwardly, fisting her hips, feeling like she should engage in small talk. But Cersei was continuing her grooming ritual, rubbing some white cream into her cheeks and then under her eyes with two fingers. Cersei glanced Brienne's way and her face became icily still. Brienne recognized it: thinly-veiled disgust. Still, at least she had attempted to conceal it. And who could blame the woman when sunbeams seemed to radiate from her every damp pore?

"Where are you from?" asked Brienne, shifting back to sit on the desk. The edge bit into her backside like teeth pushing lightly into the flesh of a hard apple. And her body was hard, not at all the peachy softness of Cersei.

"Lannisport," said Cersei, clipped.

"Interesting," Brienne replied, realizing that she had picked up her phone again. "I know someone from there."

Cersei quirked an eyebrow at this. She went to her small wardrobe and began to rummage through the various outfits. "Odd. Who do you know from there?"

"Jaime Lannister…" Brienne said, trailing off in thought. "I guess he's new here. I drove him to King's Landing." She recalled his deep, sunbaked tan and his sweatpants riding low on his hips as he swaggered to her car. _And I'm… a linebacker with a tomato head._ Jaime had noted it first, the blessed sunburn.

Cersei barely stifled a chuckle against the back of her slight hand. "Oh, that was you? He had some… colorful descriptions of you."

Brienne felt a hot blush suffuse her cheeks. _I'm gonna kill him. _"Y-You… You know him?"

Cersei did scoff this time. She pulled out a black pencil skirt, posed with it in the wardrobe mirror, and cast it on the bed. "Of course, he's my brother. _Cersei Lannister._ You really didn't know who you were rooming with?"

"Oh." _Well, that's lucky,_ Brienne thought bitterly. She could practically taste the bile rising in the back of her throat. She mentally added "insufferably good-looking sibling" to her list of things she resented about Jaime Lannister.

Cersei pried a low-cut, red blouse out of the wardrobe and grabbed the pencil skirt in the same hand. She bent gracefully to retrieve a pair of black stilettos and when she stood she began to move purposefully towards the bathroom again. Brienne tucked her chin to her chest as she watched Cersei leave the room, relief washing over in a dull wave.

"I won't be back tonight," Cersei said from the bathroom, "I'm going out."

_Thank the seven,_ Brienne thought, unfolding her blue comforter over the expanse of the bed. Cersei left the room after having delicately applied her makeup and retrieved her cellphone, hips swaying into the glass hallway beyond, mindless of the damp hair gripping her cheeks stickily. Brienne exhaled strongly, unpacked a towel from her duffle bag and rushed with eagerness towards the steamy bathroom. It was layered in immaculate porcelain, the bathtub generous in its capaciousness. Hardly any water pooled on the floor, save for a few reflective footprints. The basin was covered in organized makeup products; large cases of eye shadows and dusky bronzers ornamented its countertops.

Her hand hovered over the shower knob for a moment, before she twisted the knob for the bath and listened to the gratifying drum of the water hitting an empty tub. _Tarth,_ she thought wistfully, _I…_ _should have gone home._ Sadness was not quite the feeling. She gripped the bottom of her hooded t-shirt and pulled it up, yanking it stubbornly over her head. She threw the smelly garment down, ripped off her sports bra and pulled off her pants in a clumsy swoop. When her foot hit the hot water her whole body relaxed. She stepped in, feeling warmth lick up her calves. Brienne sat down, water flooding hungrily over her abdomen. It was only a moment before the cool sweat dripped down her neck, pooling around her dark areolas. _Anyone can be like Cersei,_ she thought, submerging her body in the heat, _In the water I'm weightless._ In the steam she imagined her face felt just as smooth, her skin just as sleek. But under the water her thighs looked unnaturally big, her feet large and squared. Toes like pebbles.

_Who are you trying to kid?_ a voice whispered in the back of her mind. It sounded eerily like a certain man, leaning against the back of her seat, breathing cruelties in her ear. She pushed it away, ducking her head beneath the hot water. He hadn't been the first to make her feel manly and ungainly, nor would he be the last. And his sister would spare Brienne another patronizing stare, that was certain. _But the two of them,_ she exhaled, watching the bubbles rise, the heat pressing uncomfortably on her eyes, _the two of them are ridiculous._ Rich, popular, irresistible. _Well, I find them both quite resistible. _Snide, condescending, sexually manipulative. She pictured the Lannister-stamped port city of Lannisport and reveled in the thought of immunity to the burgeoning presence of all things Lannister in her life. The lighting in the bathroom was far too romantic for her tastes. Too russet and moody.

Brienne raised a leg, water trickling down the short blonde hairs. _I should shave,_ she thought, but she lowered her leg back into the water. The thought of shaving so soon after seeing Cersei's baby smooth legs only made her feel hollowed out. Humiliated. An ape playing at womanhood.

* * *

_It had happened faster, she knew. Bright stars, shivering jewels winking out after a nebulous rasp. Beady pupils dilating suddenly, as if imploding in a greedy gasp for death. She expected coldness, but that came later, after the tremendous flood of hotness. The smell of singed flesh, burning metal. She could've sworn there'd been a sound but she couldn't quite recall it. She hadn't heard anything except the deadening of her heartbeat as she watched a shadow tunnel through the back of the neck, ripping free of the spinal cord in a sick crack._

_Had she fabricated that sound? A sound to accompany the broken angle? She heard the echo of her roar, deep-chested in its grief. Inhuman. Selfishly, she'd listened for her name on the wind, while his body writhed with his blood currents, gushing out in slow tides, his breath like sea foam. His spittle hardly had the time to froth over gore-smeared lips. Her fault, she was clutching his face now, mannish hands gloved in his blood. She rocked him in her arms, blood pumping indolently over her arms, through the pores of her jersey. Everything smelled of salt, his like broiling copper, hers aggregating in the sweat in her pits, bitter in the hissing tears. Rocking, rocking, no, no, no, no, no, no, don't. Don't. The skin around the bullet wound puckered obscenely. She palmed it, but the oily fluids ran down her arms, dyed the undersides of her fingernails, slipped greasily between her thighs…_

Brienne woke, sweaty, with blood coating her upper thighs. She rested her head against the pillow, overcome with exhaustion. A slight, cramping tremor ran through her abdomen and she rubbed her swollen, tender belly. She should have known; travel often did this to her. Sitting in a car for hours, legs bent stiffly beneath her—it made her begin early. She once went horseback riding with her father for four hours over a steep mountain trail known for its flirty, kissing butterflies—she had woken up to blood in the same manner, a week early.

But blood meant something very different to her, now. It hadn't meant death—not at first.

_A strange doll, that, that bobbing boy. Eyes grey and slimy. Moonfaced full to bursting. Sweet distended belly, sweet Morningstar._

Brienne cleaned herself in the bathroom, showering idly before getting dressed. She pulled on some black, cotton capris and a silvery grey t-shirt which read "VALYRIAN." When she flipped open her phone, she was almost disappointed to see that she had only slept until 8:40. But she did not did not succumb to the chilled sheets, which seemed to absorb her, sink her in strange, wintery dreams.

The Quad extended before her as she exited The Dothraki Sea, a clean, cobblestoned expanse. Several encircled flower gardens stood languidly in the ground, petal faces drinking in the fat dew drops. The sun had a gray cast to it, and the aurulent leaves tingled in the damp morning. Shrubby trees lined the grass in militaristic precision. Hardly anyone seemed to be out so early. She saw a man with lidded eyes smoking a cigarette on the steps of Bitterbridge, a dorm which consisted of several squat, creamy cottages, each with ten or so rooms. Three blocks later she reached the adjacent dorm, Claw Isle, which loomed over the domestic spread. Four white, gothic towers penetrated the fog, encasing its own quad. Two towers on the west side and two on the east, forming a tight square. A low, one story row of rooms connected the east and west towers, mirrored by the northernmost row of rooms bridging the northeast and northwest towers. This row continued for a long time as Brienne walked, for most of the block, and then ended in the southeastern tower.

She knew that tower well because he had lived there.

A tour of freshman ambled around the block, curving like a snakehead around the corner of Claw Isle. Many of them were tall and jocular, although the nerdy, fidgety types dappled the tour group as well. Brienne meant to straighten as she walked, but found herself nearly hunchbacked as she strode past the group. No one paid any attention to her, but she caught the eye of a very short man—a dwarf, now that her gaze had lingered—with sandy-blonde curls and a sharp, peach polo shirt. He held her gaze with an amused look on his face, head tilted and smirking. Brienne pretended to be staring past him, but her boorish, thick-browed, concentrated expression undoubtedly gave her away.

After some moments, she met the Golden Tooth cafeteria, a building which seemed to be made almost entirely out of glass. She smiled knowingly to herself. She had driven through Golden Tooth after the highway took them sharply north out of Silverhill, leaving behind the sunny dock city and the Casterly Rock mansion. _Found the Lannister stamp._ But there was some modesty to it, she had to admit, the allusion was mild.

When she walked through the double glass doors, she handed her ID to the uniformed lady at the cash register. She swiped along the ID's black strip like a credit card, and returned it to Brienne. Eyeing the relatively empty cafeteria tables, Brienne located the girl with flowing, auburn tresses in a patch of sunlight. Little particles of dust floated lightly through the morning rays like glitter around Sansa's fair profile.

Brienne hunkered down in front of Sansa, startling her. Brienne grimaced, noting the time on Sansa's phone as she delicately placed it beside her slick cup of orange juice. 10:30.

"I was expecting you later," Brienne said, smiling at Sansa's growing eagerness. "More like noon."

"You've always been an early riser," Sansa blurted out, eyes the size of saucers.

Brienne grunted noncommittally.

"Mother says you're going to show me all the hidden nooks of Valyrian University," Sansa said.

"The nooks I know, at least," Brienne said, shrugging. Her phone vibrated in her pocket and she took it out, flipping it open to an e-mail. She scanned it:

**To: **

**From: **

**CC: sclegane **

**Subject: MEET-UP TONIGHT!**

_Listen up, Stags! I hope your guts haven't gotten too soft during the summer because winter is coming and that means the national tournament! So we have a lot to catch up on, namely your stupefying malaise. If you want all those hot cheerleaders to think you're a sop, then go ahead and skip…_

"Can we go to the Fairmarket Café?"

"Of course." Brienne skipped past all the stupid machismo and understood that she was reuniting with the rest of the team at the gym at seven in two days. She raised her eyebrows, meeting the girl's gaze, and perceived Sansa's suppressed energy. Sansa clutched her hands tightly under the table, pale face slightly flushed. Her eyes took on a slightly jittery look as the sunlight coasted over her bright irises. But Brienne didn't ask her about it. Certainly if Sansa was too nervous to ask, Brienne likely didn't want a part of it. Instead she said, "Arya decided not to come?"

Sansa scrunched up her nose, and a few locks of red hair fell forward, cupping Sansa's slight face. "That girl wouldn't wake up at this time if the Wildlings themselves drew her out of bed by her ankles."

Brienne chuckled, knowing that to be true. She found Arya extremely charismatic in her own brash way, but the girl lacked discipline in every sense of the word. Except for in basketball. The girl had an incredible knack for free throws, arcing them into the hoop in beautiful half-circles—Brienne had even let a couple of them glide dramatically over her outstretched palm—she had hoped to play her again soon, perhaps in the newly refurbished Lemonwood Gym, slightly north of the Golden Tooth cafeteria.

_Catelyn had retained an awareness of time. She'd called the ambulance, sirens screeching minutes later, her own head sloshing in shock, pounding in the rhythm of heartbeats. It had been too late, she knew. She'd seen his tongue fall limply to the back of his throat within half-seconds of the shot._

"So…" Sansa started anxiously, gnawing on her lip.

Brienne realized she had drifted. "Hmm?"

"I… I need your permission," Sansa sucked her lip under her teeth hard, holding her breath in stiff anticipation, "I want to go to a frat party."

Brienne made a show of considering it. "No," she said flatly.

"Why _not_?" Sansa ran her fingers through her hair in exasperation, reddened lips pouting. "_Please,_ Brienne, if only you'd go with me—I—I wouldn't mind a chaperone, I would _welcome_ it—"

_I wouldn't be caught dead at a frat party._ "Your mother would sacrifice me to R'hllor."

"She would _not,_ she _adores_ you—"

_Shhh, the woman grasped her shoulders firmly, nails biting into her collarbone. Shhh, dear girl. Let them take him. She'd attempted to hoist her. Let them take him, Brienne. Her own name had shocked her into movement. She was aware that her hair was matted with blood, hardening as it was in the night's chill._

"No, she adores _you_, her _daughter._" Brienne shook her head slowly, face twisting at the memory of the one frat party she had gone to the previous year, with _him_. "There's nothing there that you would like—it's dirty, it smells like cigarettes and puke. People pee themselves they get so drunk. You've just become a senior in high school. Why do you even want to go?"

Sansa had been scrunching her nose again, but at the last question her eyes alighted, glinting and bright like a clear, summer sky. She leaned forward, hands knitted together under her chin and breathed, "Because Cersei Lannister will be there."

* * *

Jaime's eyes rolled into the back of the head, a guttural groan rolling off his tongue as his muscles clenched desperately, thirstily, pearly seed shooting into a kleenex. He felt his body weaken and he managed a shuddering breath. Sweat sheened on his torso as his member fell, flaccid, against his tight stomach. Cersei dropped the Kleenex unceremoniously on his thigh and sat up, pulling her hair over her shoulder. Months-long tension leaked from him. He felt himself calming, relaxing.

"Cersei…" he managed, a croak lodged in his throat.

"We don't have time for the full thing," she told him, gesturing to his exposed manhood.

"Please, Cers," he said again, unable to fully articulate his need.

"We don't have _time_."

"At least let me do you."

"I—"

"_Please,_ Cers." Jaime's whiny plea sounded insufferable even to his own ears, but he saw the flicker of desire in Cersei's narrowed eyes, the sexy tension in her eyebrows as she considered taking him inside of her. He half hardened, and she nodded, pulling him into a quick and violent kiss. She hiked up her dress and he moaned, but she hissed at his noisiness and he dutifully descended upon her, drinking in time, lapping up summers.

When Cersei finished, she fixed her dress and sauntered to the bathroom. _To remove the evidence,_ he thought with strange bitterness. Her taste still lingered on his tongue, his lips, and the ashy beginnings of his beard. He tossed the Kleenex in the wastebasket beside her desk, knowing that she would see it and remove it later. But he liked the idea of making her think of him when she was too preoccupied to think about him. He liked the idea of keeping her own her toes.

He never could, though. And he knew it would be the same every time. He imagined her bending to remove the Kleenex with a clinical expression, face stiff and indifferent as she flushed it down the toilet and then returned to her magazines. Or worse, dropping in a marked-up homework assignment over the pathetic vestiges of their half-lovemaking.

He stuffed himself back into his jeans, zipping up slowly. It had been a year since he'd seen Cersei. A _year_ of inflamed abstinence as she skirted the campus of Valyrian University, marking her proverbial territory through an internship at the governor's office in downtown King's Landing. She had begged him to take a leave of absence as well. _How could I bear it if you graduated before me? Where would you go? How could I do without your cock…?_ And yet, she had done just fine. For a year. While he jumped off of cliffs back at the Rock, begging his maid to make him exotic sandwiches, while he lounged on the couch, muscles twitching during televised pro-ball matches, while he burned his body up at the gym, hoping to incinerate his lust like a junkie might hope to sweat out his fix. He had come so fast and she had hardly touched him.

His father had not been pleased with his decision, but after the Aerys debacle, he had let it slide.

Jaime pinched the bridge of his nose as pressure mounted in his head. His hair fanned over the goofy, zebra-striped pillows. He liked the smell of them: jasmine. He could just barely inhale the scent over the aroma of Cersei's body on his upper lip. He felt exhausted; he wanted to sleep deeply with his sister's head tucked under his chin. He imagined the feel of their evening together, the sun sinking into the earth's body. Time would mean nothing to either of them.

"You have to go now," she told him tersely from the bathroom.

"Chill the fuck out, Cers, it's not like we're at home," he said while straining his neck to look at her. She was undressing for a shower before the big frat party, and at the sight of her round, fleshy breasts he felt an electric surge shoot down his spine.

"Go now," she said, "I have to get ready."

He obeyed, _Like I was made for anything else_, he thought, rolling dramatically off of Cersei's heightened bed. He landed on his feet with a thump and checked himself in the wardrobe mirror. _Cock in? Check._ He patted his crotch affectionately, knowing it would soften within minutes.

As he walked towards the door he heard the slight click of the heavy knob twisting and panic flared inside. _Calm down,_ he told himself, _Nothing is obvious._ The door swung open and a large, frazzled giantess hunched through the door, eyes widening as she noticed him.

He was so shocked to see her that he nearly called her by name. "_Wench?_" he sputtered. _Caught myself just in time._

"Lannister," she responded gruffly, face tightening with distaste. It was almost unbearable how ugly she could be when her face was all mashed up and squinty like she'd pulled the lid off a crock of shit.

"What're you doing here, you ugly beast?" he asked amiably, "I didn't expect to see you so soon before the next full moon."

"In case you hadn't noticed, I live here," she said, horsey teeth protruding over her lower lip, cheeks puffing up in indignation. Comical.

His face split into a grin. "I hadn't noticed. Couldn't be rid of me, could you?"

Brienne pushed the heavy door fully open, gesturing to a sign which said "CERSEI LANNISTER," and, below it, "BRIENNE TARTH." She slammed it, surely imagining his head in the frame, and crossed her arms, looking all the part of a herculean bouncer.

"Ah, _Brienne_, that was your name, was it?" Jaime slipped his fingers into his back pocket, whipped out his maroon smartphone, and rifled through it with his thumb. "I have you in my phone as something different." He handed to her.

She didn't take it, but leaned into it from a distance, like she was afraid to catch an airborne disease from him. _A disease that would likely improve her general appearance_, _completely pocked with freckles as she is_. The texted conversation read:

**Me: **_mansion at casterly rk. Lannisport. cm 12 on the 9__th. _

**Freckles: **_Bottomless stomach Lannister & co. no luggage brat._

She blushed furiously, great white eyelashes batting so hysterically he worried she might take flight. He let her fumble for quite some time, convincing himself easily that it was a kindness.

"I did wonder what it meant," Jaime drawled, "But no enlightening follow-up came."

She didn't say anything, just looked at the bathroom door, lock-jawed. _Did she not intend to send the text?_

"You realize that 'no luggage brat' is hardly an insult, don't you? In fact, you even made me _happy._ You made me _laugh._ Are you this unsuccessful in everything you do?"

She didn't respond and he didn't expect her to, she was as slow as a cow with the same dead gaze and slow blink, but she soldiered past him into the room, stopping near her bed. Finding himself incredibly entertained, he leaped on top of her bed, ass-first, reveling in the squeak of the bedframe.

"What are you doing!" she shouted, pulling on his arm with a vice-like grip.

He continued to bounce.

"And _what_ is that smell?" she shook her head, "I swear it's so humid in here like—" Brienne stopped, narrowing her eyes suspiciously.

Jaime stopped bouncing, heart speeding up. "What, wench? Spit it out."

"Don't turn my room into your personal gym, Lannister."

Jaime almost burst out laughing at the sight of her goose neck extended in thought, buck teeth like mandibles clicking together. _I'd like to see her reach conclusions more often._

"What makes you say that, Frecks?"

"It smells all sweaty and hot, sort of brackish, like—"

"…like fucking?" he supplied, biting his lower lip in an attempt to hype up his roguishness, knowing that whatever he suggested would be the last thing she accepted as truth.

"_No,_ like man sweat." She raised her eyebrows, nodding pointedly to his bare chest. He was almost dismayed that she could look upon his nude musculature without blushing anymore, all traces of androgyny gone. Pity.

"Like semen," he proffered with a nod, kicking it up a notch.

Brienne threw up her hands in an exasperated sigh, and Jaime shook out his arm where she had been gripping it. He was disappointed that she didn't squawk. Her noises were less amusing than the caricature of her face and body combo—she had a rich, thoughtful sort of voice which he would have paired with a philosopher, not with someone so constantly discomfited. And her eyes were… disturbingly striking. _A waste,_ he thought. They were icy, like water crystals, and dark, navy rings enwombed the pupils. If he looked closely at her eyes, they almost seemed to give the illusion of profundity, not vapidity.

"What would you know of sex, anyways, Wench?" he asked her, tilting his head up to look at her. Her blush had receded into the long stretch of her neck.

She turned to look at him and he faltered under her bearing, unable to detach her large, doe eyes from the air of wisdom that had settled upon her like a cloak.

"Brienne," she said quietly. Her stance was solid, her eyes faraway. Jaime suddenly felt like a third wheel. Whose memory was she pining for? Whose presence had ghosted into the room?

"Brienne, then," he conceded.

There was a moment of silence and then she said, "I think you should go."

He considered retorting, but he didn't really want to. His game had ceased to amuse him, and he felt a burgeoning guilt that almost made him spew a muculent apology over her gigantic flipper feet. _I would be even more disgusted with myself if I did that,_ he thought, but he bounced off of her bed anyway.

_He remembered those naked, white feet, pale in the starched moonlight, cold as winter._

She wasn't looking at him so he paused to reach out and graze her arm with his fingertips. When she turned to him, her broad face widened even more, alarmed. He grinned sheepishly, mussed his hair, and vacated the room.

When he walked out into the hallway, he saw a lovely young girl sitting against the opposite wall, knees pulled up under her chin as she played on her cellphone. She had auburn hair pouring over her shoulder in gentle waves and large, innocent eyes. Eyes even more innocent than the Beast's, somehow. When she looked up at him, he swore that she was too young to be at university, too young to be a freshman, even. But it was laughable to even consider the possibility that she could be related to Brienne.

And yet here she sat. He flashed her his award-winning grin: all teeth and soft eyes, but she only grimaced slightly and returned to her game of Angry Birds.

_Ah,_ he thought, _So even the young ones know._

* * *

Jaime laid on his bed with his ankles crossed, tossing popcorn into his mouth, saying, "Swish!" every time a piece landed artfully in the warm cleft of his tongue. He tossed one up, challenging himself by pitching it up halfway to the ceiling. He wiggled around on the bed, feeling the sheets bunch up beneath him, and the popcorn ricocheted off his front teeth, falling into his mouth. "Rebound!" he hollered.

"Shut up, Jaime," his roommate said, a smile in the corners of his mouth. He lay on his bed as well, right ankle resting on the left knee as he turned a page with a middle finger. He had jaw-length, dark, black hair and a rich, olive complexion. Jaime never noticed him shaving, but he maintained a thin, tailored beard. He wore a crimson, collared shirt, unbuttoned under his pectorals and indigo-blue jeans. He was as lusty as they came and bled sex appeal, much to Jaime's chagrin, with a Dornish accent that gave women whiplash.

He hated that Oberyn brought women over, it made him feel oddly vulnerable and excluded. Plus, it lacked propriety. He wasn't an idiot, he knew it stemmed from Cersei's violent fear of exposure. But he'd still asked his roommate to stop. Oberyn had shot him that frustrating half-smile, making no promises, but since the beginning of the year he had restrained himself. Now, he was reading a book about late-century politicking in Pentos, occasionally emitting a deep purr of satisfaction. Or maybe amusement. Of course, the fact that Oberyn was secretly a huge dork only gave him access to a greater pool of hearts to break.

Jaime had brushed his teeth and scrubbed his face as soon as he entered the room, wiping his body off partially with a soapy washrag, in order to avoid any prying questions. If anyone could scent a woman on him, it would be Oberyn, masked as he was with the aroma of women. His roommate would notice, eventually, that Jaime paid little attention to the beauties that sauntered into their room, scantily clad. Jaime, after all, was better trained than a hound. He had extremely regular and intense cycles of desire which followed a schedule that Cersei had internalized for sexual meet-ups during the school year. He found himself growing more irritable, more snarky when the time drew near for him to part her legs. He was like a wound spring, a shooter, and Cersei was his pusher.

It had been even worse for him over the summer. He had been an absolute wreck, all nerves, feeling both lethargic and inattentive. Once, he had googled the symptoms on his phone. The web had informed him that he was likely going through menopause. He had laughed, then. A harsh, ironic laugh. _Other half, indeed._

He needed Cersei. He needed to smell her, to feel her, to see her, to absorb the way gravity pulled fruitlessly at her breasts, the lightening of her hair in the summer, but the darkening of her nether hair when during her seasons of thirst for him…

He checked his phone: 6:00. _Finally,_ he thought. Jaime had sent out an e-mail to the basketball team a few days prior, ushering them to the gym for a bit of scrimmaging. The coach had wanted to dish out some information about training regimens—if he bothered to show up—and, so Jaime had set up a time. The meeting would likely be informal and quick; school would start after the weekend, and that's when the rest of the team would commence initiation. Or boot camp, as Clegane liked to call it.

Aerys had been the captain of the team when Jaime had first tried out. He was a good-looking guy and initially very reserved. Jaime's family name had always pissed Aerys off, that much was evident, but Jaime was a basketball prodigy in his own right. Despite the Lannister usurpation of the Targaryens in the business world, he couldn't reasonably disallow Jaime from playing varsity basketball at Valyrian University. Still, the team witnessed Aerys's mercurial disposition soon enough; the Stags experienced such violent extremes that morale plummeted. It had been one of the worst seasons in the recent history of the university.

Tywin's silent satisfaction at this had only propelled Jaime, of course.

Aerys never possessed the raw talent that Jaime had, but he was ruthless in his game tactics, and Jaime had had the athletic intuition; he'd been his right-hand man. Aerys had dubbed him Co-Captain. Titles had meant shit to Jaime, who'd had titles his whole life and nothing to show for it, but the designation had ostracized him from the team, which was already festering with Aerys's showiness, his reclusiveness, his distrust and disregard for game rules. He played very close to the foul line, orchestrating accidental knee fractures, chipped teeth… and his cold charm had both pissed off and unnerved people equally. But, save for Jaime's early season, the man won games. Sports journalists had called him "the King." He had brought fire to the collegiate world.

_They all forget how much they hated him,_ Jaime thought, popping another piece of popcorn up and missing it completely.

Of course, after the incident, he remembered seeing the naked feet, white as sugar, some smartass had started calling him the Kingslayer. And occasionally idiots get their way. The name had branded him; they'd forgotten his history before it, and even Jaime knew that there would be nothing after it.

After he'd left Aerys hanging—Jaime laughed inwardly at that—he'd become sole captain of the Stags. But his team all looked at him with cruel curiosity at the murderer in his cage. Legalism hadn't set him free, after all. When he'd requested a yearlong leave of absence, his father only protested enough to remind Jaime that he would never live up to his expectations, anyone's expectations of him. He hadn't seem disappointed with him, or proud for that matter, regretful, yes, but not in a sad way. In a cinched way with tight lips, silently despising the sloppiness of it, but not the moral dubiousness.

So, going home, some hotshot underclassmen had taken his place. He recognized him, the dead governor's youngest son. Renly Baratheon. He'd not been short of charm or talent. The team had moved on easily past the incident, past him, like a sweat-lubed fish slipping out of a fist back into the water. But the poor bastard had gotten himself shot in the spring, after a successful season, at that. And so Jaime had sent the e-mail.

He was lucky to have Oberyn as a roommate. The man had the cunning of a viper, but it was directed, never misplaced. He had hardly reacted to Aery's death; in so few words he had glossed over it. At least, he had on the surface. And when Jaime had brazenly asked him to be his roommate after a year of no contact, Oberyn had said in his smooth accent, _'Kingslayer' is already on the door._ He would not go so far as to say Oberyn was a good man—there was something poisonous about him—but he could not bear living with a _good_ man.

Perhaps that's why he ached to torment the ugly wench so much, unbruised honor and all that.

Jaime, finishing his popcorn, stood from his bed and stretched, backing cracking deliciously. He shook himself out, blood pumping hot for basketball. He went to put on a t-shirt, but then found it too ironic that he had walked around campus half-naked all day, only to put on clothes to play ball.

_Interesting that I respond to both liberty and imprisonment with clotheslessness._ Jaime thought of Cersei's gloss-lacquered mouth.

"I'm going out to go practice with the boys," Jaime said, turning to leave.

Oberyn's foot tilted downwards in acknowledgement of the statement.

* * *

The Red Waste was the primary dormitory for international students, a perfect place for Jaime to lay low from the frats, though not from the foreigners. Its interior walls were painted a magnificent carmine, making it easily the most carnal of the dormitories at Valyrian University. The baseboards wrapped all around the principal building in a sandy-crème color, and the ceilings were high, often embellished with chandeliers. Darkwood stairs absorbed the lighting, enhancing the red earthiness of the dorm. He wondered if his affinity for it was due to its oppositeness—Casterly Rock was practically composed of windows, bursting from the seams with sunlight, open archways, glass sliding doors. _We have nothing to hide,_ he could almost hear his father say.

Of course, his initial motivation was due to its proximity to Pinkmaiden, a sorority house in which Cersei planned on residing within the next two months. The plan had been stupid, in retrospect. There was no way he could even cross the premises without arousing some sort of unwanted attention. But proximity meant _something_ to him. He couldn't help it if it did.

The daylight was always shocking to him, beating him with whiteness. Sucking away his red shell, he reverted back to the Kingslayer. Jaime bent to check his shoelaces, then began to jog. The Red Waste was situated a couple miles south of campus, and the Lemonwood Gym just north of the main quad. He liked to jog to the gym to loosen up his muscles, and, on this path, hardly anyone paid any attention to him. He was just another community runner. His muscles tightened pleasantly as he passed Mistwood, and then, some blocks later, the Longbow Cafeteria. He approached the gym twenty minutes later, the thrum of his heartbeat in his ears.

He swiped his ID and entered, feeling the chilling breath of the air conditioning on his back. He nodded to the student sitting at the front desk, who reciprocated the action, strode past the line of freshly broken-in ellipticals mounted by girls in yoga pants, and proceeded to the back of the gym. He pushed past the white set of double doors and felt his mind still. He was back on the court, freshly gleaming, immaculate and without a scuff. The bleachers sat tucked in against the far wall. The place had changed but it had retained the stench of Aerys. _Aerys can try to fuck up my game if he wants,_ Jaime thought with a smirk.

He saw the towering Coach Clegane and waved, but the coach didn't see him. He was talking with someone else. A tall, blonde boy with a smattering of freckles on his—_Oh,_ Jaime thought, _Oh, for fuck's sake._ Clegane noticed Jaime the moment his smirk melted off his face, as Brienne was glaring holes through the back of his head. Next to the coach she looked like a nervous little school girl.

"I see you got lost on your way to the costume party," Jaime started, leaning on one hip, looking up slightly to meet her eyes.

"Actually, I'm here on scholarship, _Kingslayer,_" Brienne spat, lip curling into a grisly scowl.

Jaime rolled with the punch. "Oh, picked up a new nickname, have we?"

"It's not so new as you let on," she said, reigning in her disgust.

"And who told you about this riveting new chapter of my life?" Jaime drawled, shaking the hair out of his face with a brusque flip.

Brienne hesitated, glancing at a far hoop. "It was highly publicized, I just never knew it was _you_."

Jaime narrowed his eyes. _Ah,_ he realized, _The young girl outside of Cersei's room._ "Well, I won't bother worrying about how well we'll get along, seeing as you're not playing on our team. Especially not on varsity—"

"Shut your gob, Lannister!" Clegane suddenly shouted over the ridiculous repartee. "You heard the girl, she's here on scholarship. While you were taking a long piss over the cliffs, Tarth helped us almost cinch the title, no thanks to those sorry dandies you call teammates." His growl was intimidating, scarred face leering with pure threat, but Jaime was unconvinced by his speech. After all, Clegane was known for his deep indifference towards the Stags, disillusioned by college basketball for some years. He was often well into his drink for large games, white globs of spittle shining in his damp beard, barking profane orders that went largely ignored. Still, he had his strokes of brilliance.

And Jaime was sure that Brienne wasn't one of them.

"Well," said Jaime, "She looks so manly I doubt anyone would ever question it."

Brienne blushed furiously but didn't rise to the bait. She was distinctly aware of her superior's presence, now, and she wouldn't belittle herself in front of him.

This only annoyed Jaime further. He yanked her by her jersey, pulling her close to him. He vaguely registered being shocked by the brush of her thinly-clothed nipple against his forearm.

"I'm the captain," Jaime said quietly, "Not Renly. If you want to play varsity, you've got to play _me _for it." She had bristled at Renly's name, her breathing had stopped for several seconds before his fist began to swell with the oceanic heaving of her chest.

"Don't be stupid, Lannister," Coach Clegane growled. "We haven't got all damn day!"

"He's right," someone said in a strangled voice behind him. He recognized without turning that it was Loras. "Renly accepted her… she played anyone with a resenting opinion one-on-one and still managed to come out on top. He wanted her on the team."

_Stupid, lovesick boy_, Jaime thought. Of course he'd heard about the two of them. Somehow he hadn't managed to hear about Brienne, unless—the _Beauty…_? _No._ He listened to shoes squeaking as the rest of the men entered the gym. And Clegane was right, he was wasting time. Brienne's eyes looked into his, unmoving and cold. Someone has passed between them yet again, like a thin specter condensing in their shared breath. This time, Jaime had an inkling of who it was. He released her jersey. He had nothing more to say on the matter.

He didn't have to.

"Fine," she said quietly. So quietly that it seemed to reverberate around the gym, stick to his skin, more threatening in her quietness than in her feral snarling. Jaime smiled.

"Bloody morons, the lot of yeh," Clegane muttered, retreating. "The rest of you gather up while those idiots resolve their lovers' spat! Let's talk about how I'm gonna bleed you dry this season…"

Loras dribbled the ball a couple of times before tossing it to Jaime. He turned on his heel and followed the coach, sulky after the brief mention of their former captain. Jaime dribbled it a couple of times between them, bouncing it once on Brienne's foot—just to annoy her—but she stood like a stone wall before him.

"Let's say first to five points," Jaime suggested, palming the ball.

"Would you make it so easy?" said Brienne.

Jaime laughed, making his way to the center of the court. She was close behind him, squatting down in a jumping position, as if to ready herself for tip-off. He passed her the ball. She passed it back. They stood facing each other, hard.

"You'll need every advantage you can get, wench," he told her.

"I'd rather have you completely disarmed," she said, "Without any excuses as to why you lost to a woman."

_Is that what you are?_ "I'm afraid I already have an arsenal of those," he said breezily, "Namely, I'm out of shape and haven't touched a ball in a year. I'm shorter than you, and my face is less distracting than yours." Still, he dribbled the ball, bending into a squat.

"First to five," she confirmed.

He slipped away from her with no effort, spinning in a half circle and sprinting to her weaker side—her left—dashing down the court with the ball bouncing low beneath his fingertips. It was only moments before he heard her thudding footsteps and then saw her peripherally. _She's fast. It's those Godzilla legs!_ He stopped abruptly, interrupting her momentum and swirled around her, breaking right this time. He hadn't seen her fingers, but he noticed immediately when the ball ceased to make contact with his palm. Her long fingers had scooped the ball deftly from beneath his hand.

She thundered down the court, keeping the ball close to her hip, and he made it to the hoop before her. She was taller than him, but not by much, and she was forced to back into him as he surrounded her, making feints for the ball. Her dribbling technique was sound, and she switched hands back and forth too rapidly for him to make a clumsy swipe. He grunted as her ass bludgeoned his crotch, and he countered by sliding his leg to the side of her long, pale leg. He left her back exposed and as he did, she turned for a jump shot.

It was his turn to steal. He slammed it down as soon as it left her palm, fluidly intercepting it again mid-bounce as he ran down the court. The wench was there, of course, coming up on his right. He switched to his left hand and like lightning, her left hand shot out to steal the ball. Reflexively, he'd dribbled it between his legs—_but, seven hells, her reach is long_—and as she attempted to corner him, he jumped, twisting slightly away from her reach. He pitched the ball in a perfect arc and waited for it—_there, the blessed swish._

"First blood," he said, smiling in a self-satisfied way, licking the sweat from his upper lip.

"Savor it," she said flatly.

It was her turn to dribble it down the court now. He squared off with her, arms outstretched, and his fingers brushed her abdomen as she curled away from his radial purview. She ran furiously towards the hoop, and Jaime barely managed to block her upper thigh as she shot a graceful rebound. She tossed her head back, taking a deep breath. Her long, milky neck was as thick and smooth as taffy.

The ball was his and the relay continued in much the same manner with the two of them faking rights and lefts with legs outstretched and groins exposed, chests heaving, sweat dripping down the bases of their skulls. Jaime finally made a break, attempting the daring move of shooting the ball between the fleshy pillars of her legs. It was successful—she jumped in front of him, but she was too slow as the ball sank through the net. He landed a mere second before she did, glimpsing the pale freckles coating her abdomen.

There was hardly a moment's rest as they began anew, and he noticed the fierce determination in her eyes, the mechanical pumping of her legs as she gained speed. He chanced a shot with his left hand and palmed the ball, but she reclaimed it within seconds. They twisted and writhed around each other, her breath hot in his ear, Jaime's sweat dripping down the back of her thigh, but the moment came quickly when she ducked around him and he could only watch the soft follow-through of her wrist as the basketball seemed to hang, suspended over the court. It went into the net without skimming the rim, gathering force, like the moment right as a pebble first kisses the water.

_Swish,_ Jaime thought dully. Brienne had made a perfect three-pointer. She had won.

"You feel better now that yeh've embarrassed yerself, dipshit?" Coach called from the edge of the gym.

He wondered that he didn't feel more embarrassed—he suspected that would come later—but his body ached with the pleasure of a well-played game, played with skill and fairness. He hadn't played such a game in a long time. He reeked of musk. Sweat dribbled into his ear, making it itch. He went to raise his shirt, in order to wipe his face, only to remember he wasn't wearing one.

Jaime's eyes followed Brienne, thinking of the pure, lean muscle in her sinewy limbs. She walked achingly slowly, almost as if with a limp, but he could not recall hurting her. He rested his hands on his hips, curious. As she continued down the court, she straightened, hands placed slightly below the kidneys, stabilizing herself.

Realization dawned on him. It was the same posture his mother would assume, belly ripe with child, grunting with discomfort as she walked about the Rock. _The wench beat me with a belly full of blood,_ he thought. And all of his excuses died on his lips. He wasn't quite sure if it was the idle thought of Joanna, humming on a porch swing, or the short breaths before her death that made Jaime want to play her again, trapped in a mesmerized court waltz. Perhaps it was her drive. He had felt her body, listened to her heart: all raw power, power strumming her willowy muscles. He knew now, she had been in love with Renly. The boy was dead, but she had come back to the game, antlers down and charging. Jaime was desperate. He wasn't fully aware of why, just thought of his mother's long, rattling breath. _Beast, _he thought, _how'd you manage it?_

That night, Jaime dreamed fitfully of flies. They vibrated in his veins, flew, heavy with saliva, up his throat. Gagging on flies, flies in his nose. Huge, black horseflies with hairy bodies and dead-gem eyes, weaving jaggedly in his hair. A figure sat on a chair in a room, still, arms immovable on the arm rests. He groped the face, brushing flies off of the forehead, and then the nose. The flies buzzed off of the face and then landed on Jaime's arm. He squirmed, but continued to paw the face, feeling the nose and the cheeks. In one final sweep he saw the portrait, flailing at the flies in his ears. Cersei's face, looked up at him, ringed with black insects. Her eyes brushed closed. _I want you,_ she said. Her breasts emerged from the teeming blanket of insects, lactating. He raised his head to brush the liquid away, but realized, _no,_ maggots were clinging to the pebbled tips.

* * *

**Please, pretty please leave me a review and tell me what you think!**

**Miko**


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